Science and Christianity:
friends or foes?
Steve Taylor
Ever heard the following?
“
Scientists don’t believe in God ”
“At the present rate of progress, it is
almost impossible to imagine any
technical feat that cannot be achieved”
 “ Science is based on evidence,
Christianity is based on faith ”

Great scientists who are also Christians…
Past:
Faraday,
Maxwell,
Fleming
Morse etc
Today: Andrews,
Burgess,Lennox,
McIntosh, Nevin,
Wright etc
The limitations of Science

Limited remit :
‘How or what... but not why?’

Science is always changing :
No certainties
Scientific method based on repeatable experiments:
Origins ?
Science does not and cannot disprove the claims
of Christianity!


Christianity: evidence based

Creation
 Where did everything come from?
 Life from non-life… information implies
Intelligence
 Right and wrong…we are moral beings
 Design is everywhere….
‘For the invisible things of Him from the
creation of the world are clearly seen, being
understood by the things that are made;
even His eternal power and Godhead’
Romans 1:20
Sandcastle in
Oregon…Accident or
Design?
Christianity: evidence based

Bible
Claims to be the Word of God
 Teachings unsurpassed
 Never proven wrong, always correct
 Predictive prophecies fulfilled in detail….

Psalm 22…
“They pierced my hands and my feet…they look and stare at
me… they divide my garments among them, for my my clothing
they cast lots…”
Written 1000BC, 300 years before crucifixion was invented
Fulfilled in detail when Jesus was crucfied
Christianity: evidence based

Christ
The central figure of human history - BC:AD
 Claimed to be God:
 “ I and my Father are one “ John 10:30
 Eyewitness accounts of life and miracles
 Rose from the dead 3 days after crucifixion

Christianity: evidence based
‘Inasmuch as many have taken in hand to set in
order a narrative of those things which have
been fulfilled among us, just as those who from
the beginning were eyewitnesses and
ministers of the word delivered them to us, it
seemed good to me also, having had perfect
understanding of all things from the very first, to
write to you an orderly account, most excellent
Theophilus, that you may know the certainty of
those things in which you were instructed.
Luke 1:1-4
Christianity: evidence based
The former account I made, O Theophilus, of all
that Jesus began both to do and teach, until the
day in which He was taken up, after He through
the Holy Spirit had given commandments to the
apostles whom He had chosen, to whom He
also presented Himself alive after His
suffering by many infallible proofs, being
seen by them during forty days and speaking of
the things pertaining to the kingdom of God.
Acts 1:1-3
The empty tomb...
The facts:
1. Christ lived
2. Christ died
3. His tomb was empty
• predicted
• seen by witnesses
• friends
• doubters
• enemies
• believed by millions
• best explanation…?
“ He
is not here, for He is risen,
behold the place where He lay”
Matthew 28:9
Christianity: evidence based

Conversion
Then: Thomas the doubter, Paul the
persecutor, Lydia the seller of cloth…
 Throughout history: Wesley, Newton…
 Today…

Science and Christianity….
Science arose out of a Christian worldview
‘Friends… not enemies’
 Some great scientists also Christians:



Science: limited remit, no certainties:


‘It is the very nature of science, that leads me to
belief in God’ Professor John Lennox (Oxford)
On origins – speculative
Based on repeatable experiments:

The scientific method…
So where is the conflict….
Naturalism:
 ‘There is no Creator, no design, no
purpose. Everything there is emerged and
evolved by chance from an unknown
void…’
 ‘Nothing + no-one = everything’
 Unproven philosophy (not science)
 Christianity and naturalism are opposed
 Science and naturalism are opposed

Questions to the atheist….
Where did it
all come
from?
How did fine-tuned orderly Universe
arrive out of chaos by chance?
How did life arise
spontaneously from
dead material?
Some conclusions…

What is faith….
A verdict based on evidence
 Trust in a reliable person


Christianity is a reasonable faith based on
solid evidence….


creation, reason, Bible, history, Jesus Christ
The message of Jesus:
‘…the kingdom of God is at hand: repent and
believe the Gospel’
Mark 1:15